WHAT LIES BENEATH - VLOG REVIEW
I review Robert Zemeckis' What Lies Beneath .
Posts
A CHRISTMAS CAROL (2009) - REVIEW
Despite the relatively unkind feedback Robert Zemeckis received after experimenting with CG animation in The Polar Express , he persevered and, in 2009, he delivered his own version of A Christmas Carol starring Jim Carrey as Ebeneezer Scrooge... and the three ghosts. While the animation in Polar Express gave an unwanted creepy puppet quality to the child characters, here the visuals are much more polished and the actors' expressions are captured perfectly. It's fascinating to see Jim Carrey being turned into, not only an old man, but a younger Scrooge, a candle ghost and a big bearded spirit dude. The rest of the cast, which includes Gary Oldman, Colin Firth and Bob Hoskins, are also beautifully rendered into their CGI characters. There are still creepy visuals but this time it's very much on purpose as Zemeckis appears to have picked the scariest aspects of Polar Express and Beowulf in order to give every kid watching this movie nightmares throughout the holiday se
CAST AWAY - REVIEW
Because making a straight-up Robinson Crusoe movie would have been too easy, director Robert Zemeckis went for Cast Away instead: a modern-day retelling of the familiar tale of a man stuck on a desert island. With only the love of FedEx to keep him warm at night. Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks) is the put-upon castaway whose FedEx plane crashes in the sea in one of the film's best, most effective sequences. We then follow him as he slowly but surely comes to terms with his new life alone on the deserted island he randomly found himself on. With only coconuts and the odd (raw) fish to eat, he struggles at first but eventually starts to learn some key survival skills which end up saving his life in the four years he ends up spending on the island. That and the company of a personalised volleyball he calls Wilson, one of the film's biggest characters and most genius product placement ideas. Hanks' very own physical transformation during the making of the film certainly add